RIP Donald Westlake

[silverscreenselect]

Prolific mystery writer who wrote mostly light stories under his real name and some very hard nosed ones under the best known of his pseudonyms Richard Stark.

Westlake stories often featured bumbling robbers who managed to mess up complicated heists and then struggle to get away with it. Under the Stark name, his main character was a cold blooded killer named Parker who usually found himself being double crossed by various associates and plotting revenge. He also got an Oscar nomination for the screenplay for The Grifters (not based on his own work) and wrote the screenplay for The Stepfather, a cult favorite.

The best film from a Stark novel was John Boorman's Point Blank with Lee Marvin as Parker. That film was later remade as Payback with Mel Gibson in the Parker role. The best film from a Westlake novel was The Hot Rock with Robert Redford as the main character John Dortmunder.

Age 75.

The end of the old year, beginning of the new is seeing a lot of celebrity deaths.

[silvercamaro]

My heart is clenched like a fist. Westlake was one of my favorite people on the planet.

I met him perhaps 20 years ago, and I adored him. I still do. In person, he was as funny as his best books and absolutely charming. I was the assistant director (i.e. flunky) of a university writers conference. Although I didn't know him, I tracked down Westlake's phone number at his Greenwich Village apartment on Bleecker Street. (That detail sticks in my mind.) I called to invite him to be our headliner. We could offer virtually nothing for taking three days out of his life, but to my surprise, he said "Yes" anyway. I asked him later why he had agreed so cheerfully. "When you called," he said, "the conference was more than six months away. I figured the world might come to an end by then."

Snaxx and Etaoin should know that he loved trains. His one disappointment about coming to Oklahoma, he said, was his discovery that it was not possible to make the trip via Amtrak. Because of the dual disappointment (Amtrack lack and the continuation of the world), we managed to sweeten the compensation pot by absconding with an old brick from a campus sidewalk. The brick was engraved with the name of an Oklahoma Territory brickyard, and it would find a home in his collection at his summer home on Fire Island. He was delighted to carry it back to New York in his suitcase.

In addition to the credits listed by sss (which don't begin to reflect how wonderful his books are -- particularly, IMO, the Dortmunder books about a bumbling burglar "everyman"), but he also was the screenwriter for a number of films, including many based upon his own novels, as well as The Grifters, which got four Academy Award nominations.

[Ritterskoop]

SC, thanks for your account. Not to dump on SSS's version, but you obviously had a very close connection to him, and your obit reached me.

[themanintheseersuckersuit]

He was one of my favorites.

[ulysses5019]

I too remember reading and enjoying his books when I was younger.

[SportsFan68]

Thanks, SSS and SC. Most Excellent Reports.

The Hot Rock is my absolute favorite Robert Redford movie. The rest of the cast is brilliant too. I had no idea I had Donald Westlake to thank.

Someday when I get signed up on Netflix I'll get the original Payback.

[gsabc]

I knew the name looked familiar. The Hot Rock is one of my two all-time caper movies. I went to get his books from the library after seeing it for the first time.

Lots of celebrities gone early this year. Hope it's not a trend.

[silverscreenselect]

I knew the name looked familiar. The Hot Rock is one of my two all-time caper movies. I went to get his books from the library after seeing it for the first time.

Another Dortmunder movie was Bank Shot with George C. Scott, also from the early 70's (which is when most of the Westlake/Stark films were made). In that one, the Dortmunder character (renamed for the film) and his crew don't rob a bank; they steal it, taking a bank branch located inside a double wide mobile home. Despite the premise, it wasn't nearly as good as Hot Rock.

Point Blank is undoubtedly the best Stark movie. The key to playing Parker is to make the character completely amoral and cold blooded, and Lee Marvin, who had a history of playing thugs and psychos, was a perfect choice. When Mel Gibson took on the role, the studio was unwilling to play the character quite that nastily so the movie was recut over the director's wishes and the results were somewhat watered down. A director's cut is available on DVD that is supposedly closer to the original feel of the novel (I've never seen it).

There are a couple of other Stark films that I wish would be released on DVD. The Outfit starred Robert Duvall as the Parker character and is another one of the worthy hard boiled crime films of the early 70s styled after The French Connection. The Split, which concerns the aftermath of a robbery at the LA Coliseum during a playoff football game, featured Jim Brown in his first starring role as the Parker character. Not as good as the others but still worth a watch for a terrific supporting cast with Gene Hackman and Ernest Borgnine among others. Ironically, Parker is never called Parker in any of these movies. Lee Marvin was Walker; Mel Gibson was Porter.

Another interesting Westlake film is The Stepfather, an original screenplay, which featured Lost's Terry O'Quinn as a man who is obsessed with marrying into the "perfect" family. Inevitably, his new families disappoint him with homicidal results. The film is being remade this year with Dylan Walsh in the O'Quinn role (Westlake was not involved in the remake).

[silvercamaro]

Some of Westlake's best on-screen lines came from a script-doctor project for which he got no screen credit: Silver Streak.

My favorite bit was when Gene Wilder asked Jill Clayburgh, who had no apparent employment skills, how she got her job as assistant to an art historian. She answered, "I give good phone."

[ToLiveIsToFly]

I will miss him. I am stunned that he is only 75 - he's written so much great stuff, and his pictures on the back of his books have looked cadaverous for as long as I can remember. I've been mentally prepared for each of his books to be his last, and now I feel a little cheated that he died so young.

Folks who live in the Boston area - the Brattle Theater shows Point Blank every so often - it's every bit as good as SSS says.

I also really liked The Outfit, though I don't can't say how much I would have liked it if I weren't already a huge Parker fan.

I often think I'm in the minority when I say I liked the film version of The Hot Rock. I was pessimistic going in about how someone as famously good-looking as Redford could play Dortmunder, but he pulls it off really well. Even more perfect, to me, was George Segal as Stan Murch. I can no longer picture Murch any other way. (Dortmunder, in my mind's eye, still looks like Dan Hedaya).

I haven't read anything about new books in the pipeline, and I sure hope there are. But if not, the Nobody Runs Forever / Ask the Parrot / Dirty Money series leave Parker in a fitting place.

[ToLiveIsToFly]

Under the Stark name, his main character was a cold blooded killer named Parker who usually found himself being double crossed by various associates and plotting revenge.

I take a little exception to this description of Parker. I was going to object to the "cold blooded" part, but as I think about what that adjective means, I guess it's accurate - he's indifferent about killing, as opposed to someone who actively seeks it out. And he often, maybe even usually, found himself being double crossed by associates. But I don't think he spent very m]uch time at all plotting revenge. He was far too pragmatic for that. The first book (The Hunter aka Point Blank aka Payback) may be an exception, but even there it was more about getting what was his than revenge. Almost every other time I remember him killing someone (and there were a LOT) it was because his life would be better with that person dead, as opposed to him thinking the person deserved to die.

[SportsFan68]

. . . Even more perfect, to me, was George Segal as Stan Murch. I can no longer picture Murch any other way. (Dortmunder, in my mind's eye, still looks like Dan Hedaya).

I agree, Segal is perfect. So often, we make such a big deal about leads, but sometimes it's the supporting characters who are just fabulous and make the movie wonderful.

[Bob Juch]

I was talking to an assistant at CAA today. When I mentioned this, he said he had no idea who Donald Westlake was.

[silvercamaro]

I was talking to an assistant at CAA today. When I mentioned this, he said he had no idea who Donald Westlake was.

His loss.

[themanintheseersuckersuit]

To the library today for a copy of God Save The Mark.

[minimetoo26]

I adored his stuff. It was lightweight and funny, with enough character and plot to keep you reading.

I think the last thing I read was Drowned Hopes. Cracked me up.